Hell Is a Game Show: an Artistic Interpretation Of
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HELL IS A GAME SHOW: AN ARTISTIC INTERPRETATION OF THE AFTERLIFE ______________________________ A Thesis Presented to The Honors Tutorial College Ohio University _____________________________ In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for Graduation from the Honors Tutorial College with the degree of Bachelor of Fine Arts in Film _____________________________ by Zachary Stoner May 2018 Stoner 1 “Hell is other people,” shouts Joseph Garcin in Jean-Paul Sartre’s 1944 play Huis Clos (No Exit). It was this sentiment that summarizes the entire play: man can never escape the judgment of others and in turn is always in the hell of his own self-judgment. It is this quote, in its various forms and parodies, that would come back to haunt me in ironic ways. But it was also this play that took me down the path that would eventually lead me to the creation of my film: Hell is a Game Show. This project starts before Sartre, with my junior year film Near Sighted: The Usually Alone Interview - specifically with a supporting actress by the name of Evie Weir. Her acting was smart and funny, a natural with the kind of dark comedy that I had become so fond of writing. There’s an old Hollywood expression that goes “directing is ninety percent casting,” and I planned to take that a step further and write my thesis film around a talented actress that had a great knowledge of the craft. I had just finished watching two dark comedies: Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005) and Seven Psychopaths (2012). Both feature comedy that relies heavily on horrible murder or torture. The former features a comedic scene where Robert Downey Jr.’s character loses his finger when his ex girlfriend smashes it in a door, while the prior has a running gag about Woody Harrelson’s gun always jamming when he is trying to execute people. I had at this point a vague idea of what I wanted my film to be: a dark comedy with a strong female lead. My first thought was a show similar to The Bachelorette. On this show, about twenty men compete for the love and affection of one leading lady (the “bachelorette”). This was an area of reality television that I felt was rather untouched by dark comedy. With my experience in comedy writing, this surprised me. After watching a handful of episodes there were plenty of places where just a slight increase in absurdity Stoner 2 could lead to strong moments of comedic irony and satire. For example, what if the bachelorette was murdering the contestants? Following the same tropes of the show, but adding this element of horror, would be comedy gold. There was just one major issue. Most of the tropes of this show revolve around splendor. They all stay in a giant mansion and wear fancy clothes and go on exotic dates. These things are what make the show interesting to watch, and unfortunately, very hard to replicate on a student-film budget. So it was back to the drawing board, but this time I returned with a clearer sense of vision. In fact, The Bachelorette did leave me with another idea: the television game show. Where high budget and high production value was crucial with a replication of The Bachelorette, the lack of those things can become part of the character and kitsch of a game show. I was then faced with the challenge of turning a light hearted, family-friendly show into a dark, absurd comedy. I had just written a comedy piece based heavily on Dante’s Inferno (the first third of the Divine Comedy) and John Milton’s Paradise Lost, specifically on the relationship between biblical characters and their interaction with mortal human beings. It was with these two classical works on my mind that I decided that this was the angle I needed to take. I needed my game show to take place in Hell. It was at this point that I read Jean-Paul Sartre’s play No Exit. Within this play, three individuals are placed into a room where they become the source of eternal torture for the other two. The part that stuck with me the most was that the door to this room was not locked. Any of the characters could have left whenever they wanted. It was the uncontrollable need to be around the other characters and the assumed guilt they would feel upon leaving that kept them together in the room. Having the system built in a way that traps the characters even though they have the illusion of freedom is something that I Stoner 3 knew had to be in this short film, as the culmination of the torture. The contestants on this Hell game show would compete for their freedom, only to have it stripped away at the very moment they believe that they have achieved it, much like the Myth of Sisyphus.1 The minor difference, of course, is that Sisyphus’ torture is not being broadcasted on television. I now knew that I had to create my own, unique take on Hell. There has been no shortage of texts on the subject, so I wanted to read and watch some of the various works featuring artistic representations of Hell so that I could create my own unique version. The trick was going to be blending the tropes of Hell with the tropes of old, campy game shows to fabricate the perfect blend of the two. The first film that I watched on the subject was Inferno (2016). Directed by Ron Howard, this film was based on Dan Brown’s 2013 novel of the same name. The film follows professor Robert Langdon as he attempts to stop a world-cleansing plot by following clues hidden in Dante’s Inferno and Sandro Botticelli’s Map of Hell (which is also based on Dante’s Inferno). This film was a terrific starting point for my journey into the underworld, not only because that is literally what Dante’s Inferno is about, but also because this film directly addresses the fact that a majority of texts use Dante’s depiction of Hell as the real depiction of Hell. The example used most heavily in this film to support this statement is Botticelli’s Map of Hell. It directly depicts the layers of Hell described in the Divine Comedy. This was beneficial because it also put into historical 1 The Myth of Sisyphus, an essay by Albert Camus, follows a man named Sisyphus whose eternal punishment is to push a boulder to the top of a hill, only to have it fall back down to the bottom when he reaches the top. Stoner 4 context the Hell that most people think of when they think of Hell - the fire and brimstone, Christian underworld. The next film on my list was Constantine (2005). Serving as the directorial debut for Francis Lawrence, this film was an adaptation of the DC Comic Hellblazer. This film follows John Constantine, an occult detective assigned to send demons back to Hell in order to earn favor with Heaven. This film takes heavily from Milton’s Paradise Lost, specifically the ongoing battle between Lucifer and Heaven. This film also portrays Hell in Dante way, with fire and tortured souls all about. The unique take with this Hell depiction is that it is just the real world, but in fire and ruins. When Constantine enters Hell for the first time, it is as if the world around him becomes Hell. The thing about this film that struck me the most, and that most directly influenced my writing of the script, was the character of Lucifer. Although this is by no means a comedic film, Lucifer’s character shows such a twisted humor about what he is doing. Instead of being depicted as a giant monster or a demon, he is shown as a human male that just gets a sick rush out of torturing souls. When he goes to light Constantine’s final cigarette, he moves the lighter away from him a few times, making him move for it. This is a very dark, kind of chilling portrayal of the devil that I knew I needed to absorb for my film. Moving forward came What Dreams May Come (1998), another novel adaptation. The title comes from William Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Directed by Vincent Ward, this Robin Williams-led film follows Chris Nielsen through his life and after his death. This film focuses heavily on the Heaven side of Hell, but slowly turns into a Dante-esque tale when Chris has to go save his wife (Annie) from Hell since she committed suicide. Hell is a typical firestorm, with the center depicted as Chris’s home, abandoned and run down. Stoner 5 What made this film’s depiction of Hell so unique is its use of personal nightmares. Since it is Annie’s Hell, it is made up of things that scare her and torture her. This is the same way the film portrays Heaven, as all of the characters are who they want to be. For example, Chris’s dead son wants to Albert Lewis, so that is who he is. Everything in this film’s afterlife is personalized to the person experiencing it. All of the films to this point have been leaning on the serious side, so for my film’s needs I had to branch out and watch a few comedic films that depicted Hell. The first was South Park: Bigger, Longer, & Uncut (1999). Directed by Trey Parker, this film the most absurd of Hell depictions.